Globally focused U.S. property funds are gaining favor with yield-hungry investors who are pouring capital into the vehicles to profit from their exposure to the fast-growing economies of Asia, research showed.
These funds drew 32 percent of the $10.1 billion of inflows into U.S. property funds for the year to end-May, although they hold a proportionately smaller share of the market, a Lipper survey of 385 U.S. property funds showed………………………………………..Full Article: Source

Investors searching for safety, high yields and steady cash flows are increasing their allocation to global real estate and infrastructure, executives of RREEF, Deutsche Bank AG’s Alternative Asset Management division, said on Thursday.
“When you look at real assets, such as real estate and infrastructure that provide good cash flows, that provide some inflation protection, as part of a broader investment portfolio, all the investors that we’re speaking with want to increase their allocations to these asset classes,” Pierre Cherki, managing director and Global Head of RREEF, said at the Reuters Global Real Estate and Infrastructure Summit………………………………………..Full Article: Source

Institutional investors, including pension funds, remain optimistic about the US real estate market, where they see a large pipeline of deals across all sectors.
According to a report published by accountancy firm PwC, investors are aggressively pursuing deals as they continue to see signs the industry’s overall fundamentals are stabilising and even improving in certain sectors and regions………………………………………..Full Article: Source

Despite new homes sale reaching record lows for the first time in three months in May, Steve Blitz, senior economist at ITG research, and Megan McGrath, executive director and senior analyst at MKM Partners, told CNBC they are optimistic about the housing market.
“The general takeaway on new home sales is that it is going to stick at these levels for an extended period of time, until we work down the inventory on existing homes,” Blitz said………………………………………..Full Article: Source

Purchases of new houses probably dropped in May for the first time in three months, showing the real-estate market is struggling to gain traction.
Sales decreased 4 percent to a 310,000 annual rate last month, according to the median forecast of 67 economists surveyed by Bloomberg News. Another report may show applications for unemployment insurance benefits were little changed last week………………………………………..Full Article: Source

New home sales and existing home sales dipped last month and prices continue to fall. But the slump is sowing the seeds of its own housing recovery.
Sales down. A huge shadow inventory. A double-dip in prices. It’s hard to find anything encouraging to say about today’s housing sector. But slumps have a way of sowing the seeds of their own recovery. And this one is no different………………………………………..Full Article: Source

What better time than the summer solstice to shine a light on current commercial real estate market conditions. CRE firms and organizations released a broad array of mid-year market overviews and viewpoints this past week - all of which cast conditions with a fairly sunny outlook.
We report on the views presented by four respected analysts, including Credit Suisse, which is telling global investors to follow other world currencies flowing to the United States. Also, Maximus Advisors and Fannie Mae both say the U.S. multifamily market is poised for a four-year upswing. And RREEF Global Real Estate Investment says U.S. investors would do well to look closely at the industrial and retail property sectors………………………………………..Full Article: Source

Beacon Capital Partners has sold Liberty Place, a 12-story building located six blocks from the U.S. Capitol, for $139 million or $870 a square foot, underscoring the ongoing strength of the Washington, D.C., office market.
Paramount Group Inc was the buyer of the building at 325 Seventh St. NW overlooking the National Mall, said Eastdil Secured Managing Director John Kevill, who co-brokered the sale with partner Collins Ege………………………………………..Full Article: Source

The real estate market will see improvement in the remainder of this year and in 2012, but is unlikely to recover until 2013 or beyond, said speakers at this week’s Pacific Coast Builders Conference (PCBC). The conference is sponsored by the California Building Industry Association.
Held yearly at San Francisco’s Moscone Center, PCBC attendees include builders, investors, developers, manufacturers, scientists, architects, environmental engineers and landscapers, among others………………………………………..Full Article: Source

Moody’s Investors Service announced yesterday that transaction prices on commercial properties fell 3.7% during April 2011, according to the Moody’s/REAL Commercial Property Price Index (CPPI).
That’s the fifth straight month of decline, and the index shows that property values are now an astonishing 49% below the peak that they reached in October 2007. In fact, the index has now reached a point that is down 2.1% from where it started in December 2000 — that is, property values are lower now than they were more than 10 years ago………………………………………..Full Article: Source

Pan-European pooled property delivered a total return of 2.2% in the first quarter of 2011, according to the IPD Pan-European property funds index.
The index, now in its second quarter of consultative release, is one of the few indicators for comparable cross-border performance in Europe. Consisting of 18 open-ended funds, worth €11 billion, of which €7.8 billion are specialist and €3.2 billion balanced portfolios, the index’s performance is in line with the UK’s for open ended vehicles, which recorded 1.9% in Q1 2011………………………………………..Full Article: Source

Debates on multi-channel retailing dominated ICSC’s 36th European Conference, held this year alongside the French National Council of Shopping Centres’ SIEC Retail Real Estate Exhibition, which drew delegates from more than 28 countries.
At the conference, attended by the industry’s most senior and experienced representatives, debate raged particularly on the opportunities presented through multi-channel retailing………………………………………..Full Article: Source

Investor rivalry for blue chip London commercial property has forced prices up and yields down, compelling many to mull a so-called emerging “upper secondary” class to pick up choicely priced assets and appealing returns.
“What we are finding is weight of money buying certain stock at a certain price. There are offices now — these aren’t 25-year leases but core-plus central London — being viewed as prime,” Pramerica Managing Director Andrew Radkiewicz said………………………………………..Full Article: Source

Leading analyst said prices could fall 10pc if the mortgage market does not recover. The latest housing data, which indicates a big drop in remortgage activity, and only sluggish growth in the number of mortgage approvals is likely to further depress prices in many parts of the country, according to leading economist.
The British Bankers’ Association (BBA) reported that mortgage approvals for house purchases only edged up to 30,509 in May after dipping to 29,747 in April from a still weak but seven-month high of 31,394 in March………………………………………..Full Article: Source

The majority of homes bought in Britain are worth less now than they were five years ago, new research suggests.
Some 3.5 million properties, or 80%, bought since 2006 are said to be “underwater”, or worth less than their purchase price, according to a study by Zoopla.co.uk………………………………………..Full Article: Source

The UK government is to set up a board including property industry representatives to hammer out agreement ahead of a ‘carbon plan’ to be published later this year.
Business minister Mark Prisk and government chief construction adviser Paul Morrell will represents the government on the new board………………………………………..Full Article: Source

All the signs indicate that the Portuguese property market is still slowly deteriorating, as figures from the May RICS/CI Portuguese Housing Market Survey show sales activity and pricing are continuing to weaken.
Further gloom comes in the form of the National Activity and National Confidence Indices which both dropped seven points to -39 and -60 respectively. The country is currently braced for a new wave of austerity measures as the newly elected Social Democratic government is under a lot of pressure from both the IMF and the EU to implement measures they considered necessary in order to secure an EU bailout of about £70 billion………………………………………..Full Article: Source

Poland is not a traditional second home location but it is becoming increasingly popular with real estate investors looking to rent out their properties, it is claimed.
Poland is experiencing steady growth and can now be regarded as among the top hot spots for residential property investment in Europe, according to Louise Reynolds of Property Venture………………………………………..Full Article: Source

Investing in agricultural land is set to become extremely interesting for pension funds from a strategic point of view, according to the managing director of Denmark’s AP Pension, but he said the time was not yet right to buy Danish farmland.
AP Pension managing director Søren Dal Thomsen said: “Purely strategically, it will be highly interesting for a pension fund such as AP Pension to invest in agricultural land.”……………………………………….Full Article: Source

With luxury property developer Yoo launching two new developments in Moscow this year, buying a home in Russia’s booming financial hub looks a more tempting prospect. While the heady days that saw Moscow’s property prices rocket 110 per cent in value are behind us, the more mature market for homes in Moscow is still intriguing.
But as with any post-communist market, just 20 years young, there are a few quirks that buyers should be aware of. Here’s our guide………………………………………..Full Article: Source

Kenya property investors could see a boost in the market over the coming months after Kisumu hosts the Homes Expo tomorrow (June 24th).A host of exhibitors will be at the event and hope to uncover the potential opportunities the city has.
Samson Murethi, an investment analyst for special projects at Shelter Afrique, claimed, however, that more funding is needed to meet the high demand for property in Kisumu.”There is a high demand for housing but underfunding is an impediment. I feel the event will make our prospective customers realise how much they can benefit from us,” he said………………………………………..Full Article: Source

Greater transparency on fee structures is needed to secure growing levels of capital to the Asian non-listed property funds industry, according to the first ever report on fees in the region.
The ANREV Management Fees & Terms Asia Study 2011 reports that fee structures lack comparability as non-listed property funds base their charges on a wide variety of type, number and bases of fees. This hinders transparency and makes it difficult for investors to review and compare funds………………………………………..Full Article: Source

Taoyuan Village, the first affordable-housing project in the southern boomtown of Shenzhen, should be a shining example of Beijing’s ambitious $600 billion plan to offer high-quality housing for the millions of Chinese priced out by the urban property boom.
But the residents of this new town, with its gleaming high-rises and clean lanes, have a different view………………………………………..Full Article: Source

Prices have zoomed up close to 70 percent since the start of 2009 — the 24.2 percent rise for the 12 months through the end of March alone put Hong Kong at the top of a comparison of 50 countries, according to a report released this week by the Knight Frank agency. The activity has left many owners and investors wondering if the notoriously volatile Hong Kong market is about to shift again.
Several analysts are suggesting the market is headed for a downturn of as much as 30 percent………………………………………..Full Article: Source

Human being is not particularly good at learning from history. Either we haven’t lived long enough to live through every moment of it, or we just forget what we have lived through.
The terrible property crash of 1997 led to almost 70% drop of home prices in nominal terms for 6 consecutive years. Today, many analysts are still very bullish (with Andrew Lawrence as the early exception), and are trying hard to explain why property prices today can’t drop, and how much healthier the market is today relative to 1997………………………………………..Full Article: Source

Singapore’s property market will see a strong second quarter this year with the new home sales volume expected to hit 4,000 units.
According to CB Richard Ellis, this would make it 11.3 per cent higher than the 3,595 new homes sold in the first quarter and close to the 4,241 units sold in the fourth quarter of 2010………………………………………..Full Article: Source

The commercial property market appears unaffected by the introduction of a luxury tax this quarter, with the average transaction price inching up from the preceding quarter, while the vacancy rate edged down on recovering demand, a report said.
The average transaction price for office space nationwide reached NT$708,900 (US$24,444) per ping (3.3m2) this quarter as of Wednesday, up slightly from NT$690,000 three months earlier, as investors returned to the market, according to a survey by the global asset management division of Sinyi Realty Co……………………………………….Full Article: Source

The Australian housing market is beginning to feel the struggles that the United States and Europe have already been feeling for several years now. The American Bureau of Statistics shows that owner-occupied housing loans are down by 1.5% in March when original projections showed over a 2% rise.
The amount of loans that consumers are taking out is significantly lower than ever before despite annual incomes increasing over the past several years………………………………………..Full Article: Source